Exhibition Vista 2 – AFTEC 15th Anniversary

Vista 2: Thinking to Being

The arts offer us performances & exhibitions. And more . . .

They enhance the quality of the audience with their inherent powers.

In this vista, AFTEC’s 5 signature projects take you from primary schools to professional training, all seeding grounds for transformation.

Through deep engagement in the arts, we have evolved a creative learning system & is now adopted across the board in arts & non-arts based programmes.

From research on future jobs to the World Economic Forum, creativity, critical thinking, communication & collaboration are four indisputable components to capacity building in young people. The arts’ inherent powers build all these. Listen to The Garden audio tour.

Sm-ART Youth (2012 – 2020)

Sm-ART Youth Project is the seed project from which AFTEC’s subsequent creative learning system grew.

With classroom activities, cultural outings and parents’ exchange sessions, children from grassroot families are encouraged to rekindle their innate curiosity, cultivate a reflective habit of mind and become self & socially aware.

Economic poverty is dire. Poverty of the imagination is worse. Cramped physical living conditions in subdivided flats also mean that the minds, hearts & spirits of children are locked in a vicious cycle of little exposure, strait-jacketed linear thinking & low aspirations. Sm-ART Youth is the first project that demonstrates the civic role of the arts to break barriers.

Cultural Outing
St. Bonaventure Catholic Primary School

Sm-ART Youth The First Gardeners
2015-16 Sm-ART Youth Visual Diary Volunteer
2015-16 University Practicum Trainees
2016-17 Creative Classroom Beginnings
Sm-ART Youth 2018-20 Testimonial from Volunteers and Parents
2017/18 Showcasing the Year

Bravo! HK Youth Theatre Awards (2012 – 2020)

Bravo! Hong Kong Youth Theatre Awards (2013-2020) offer unprecedented high level training for young people passionate about acting in Chinese or English. Each cohort is cultivated over 1.5 years locally & overseas.

A reflective habit of mind is one amongst many personal values nurtured as young people mature in body, mind and emotions.

After local training, a month-long cultural immersion at tertiary level is offered to a quota of young actors to train in London & Taipei.

Seeded in late 2011, Bravo! is tailor-made for 13-18 year olds, with priority for youth from grassroot families. After initial workshops and a production in Hong Kong, those who have attained specific standards are selected for further immersion at either The Cloudgate Dance School in Taipei or The London Academy of Music & Dramatic Art (LAMDA) in London. The project has been on hold since 2020.

Bravo! won the 9th Hong Kong Arts Development Awards for Arts Education in 2014.

Reflections (2015-16)
Bravo! International
LAMDA, London

Bravo 1: Searching @ LAMDA
Bravo 2: Breaking New Grounds @ LAMDA
Bravo 2: A Different Experience @ Cloudgate
Bravo 3: Power of Perseverance
Bravo 4: Against All Odds
Bravo 4: Three Queens Highlights

Performing Arts in the Medical Humanities (2012 – present)

Performing Arts in the Medical Humanities is a compulsory credit-bearing creative learning module developed in tandem with clinicians at the Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, for early years medical undergraduate training.

Beginning with knowledge and self-exploration to embodiment of attitudes and behaviours nurtured through clinical practice, the workshops cover the themes of Culture & Care and Doctor Patient Identities.

As the Community Partner to the programme, AFTEC’s workshops support medical students’ humanities aspect of medical science by engaging them in theatre, movement and music, developing their capacities for empathy for others.

This programme won the 12th Hong Kong Arts Development Awards for Arts Education in 2017.

Movement & Relationships
Drama I
Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong

Creative Arts in the Medical Humanities

The curriculum draws on the humanities, the arts and the social sciences, whose approaches value observation, perspective-taking, reflection, tolerance of uncertainty and individual context. These bring insight into who we are as human beings who suffer, heal, and have responsibilities to each other and who struggle with the complexities and ambiguities of issues inherent in medical care and practice.

The following creative works are examples of the first-year capstone project in which students demonstrate critical engagement with these issues. AFTEC is specially exhibiting these artworks in support of the multiple clinicians who have taught students through other non-performing aspects of the medical humanities including narrative & literature, film, visual arts and experiential learning.

Shadows
Yiu On Lap
2014-15

These shadows move away from the patient in half transparency depicting doctors’ emotions and experiences often hidden from their patients. This helps to gain confidence from patients; however, this might also make doctors vulnerable as they try to conceal their feelings from themselves. It is important for doctors to realise that they are also human, with weaknesses and strong emotions.

Complementarity & Complexity
Yue Ru Bing Serena
2020-21

This artwork features the anterior view of the spinal column from brainstem to sacrum with nerves in different colours. The nervous system is responsible for integrated coordination of the body. In the centre, the nerves converge and intertwine into braids. Each braid represents a decision moment doctors and patients encounter: surgery or chemo? Continue lifestyle changes or start medication? Do benefits of treatment outweigh risks? Should we switch to palliative care? This process can be straightforward, or uncertain, or heartbreaking, as represented by different braids that vary in length, pattern, and complexity. Ultimately, the artist wishes to express the complementarity of doctors and patients as they navigate their relationship.

The God-given Face and Another
Chen Ting Hin Hugo, Lui Chun Hei Jessica, Wong Ying Ariel
2021-22

With its title inspired by the conversation between Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Ophelia regarding women’s duality, this artwork was created during the pandemic, centering on the Inverse Care Law phenomenon. By juxtaposing a single patient with many attending medics to the grave consequences of under-resourcing, we hope to encourage reassessment of medical care distribution, and strive to achieve justice for all patients.

Jockey Club Arts & Actions Project: Arts for Empowerment (2018 – 2022)

Jockey Club Arts & Actions Project: Arts for Empowerment is a very special three-year project in which two schools serving students with social/emotional needs engage in multiple art forms.

There are eight Schools for Social Development in Hong Kong. Two were involved in the project for just under four years. By the time the project was completed, and thanks to the passion and dedication of innumerable artists & teachers, every single student in both schools was involved in a multi-artform reflective expedition linking the inner self to the outside world. Fearing less, reaching out much more.

Jockey Club Arts-based Cross Curriculum Creative Learning Project (2021 – present)

Jockey Club Arts-based Cross Curriculum Creative Learning Project is a three-year pilot creative learning system developed from AFTEC’s 14 years of experience.

Diverse creative domains are matched with two subjects of choice in each school with the curriculum co-designed & co-implemented by school teachers & creative practitioners.

This student-centred creative partnership programme aims to prepare young people for the challenges of the 21st century by developing their Creativity, Critical thinking, Communication, Collaboration skills for Contribution to social capital (“5Cs”), bringing about an increase in creative practices in schools for Primary 4-6 students.

Visual Diary 2021-22
Knowledge Exchange: Building Creative Classrooms 2021-22
Spotlights on students 2021-22

Animals

These are the animals featured in our garden. They are the bearers of good tidings that you can discover from The Garden audio tour. Instead of fictitious creatures, we thought a certain familiarity could be brought here. These animals, from the smallest Damselfly to the largest Barking Deer, are all found locally. Seek them out as you listen to the audio guide!